To Kill A Dragonborn
by spacefarts
Summary: A Breton assassin arrives in Skyrim to kill the fabled Dragonborn, a few years after Alduin's defeat.


**Please read:** this is a story with a lot of creative control. There will be appearances by many Skyrim favourites, but both of the main characters are my own invention.

I played Skyrim many times but I never did a back-story playthrough. I made a guy, and made his back-story, and it was so much fun I wrote it all down! Then I thought hey, let's take this a step further and have complete creative control over the plot. So this story came to be. It's written in diary-esque chunks, but the further we get in the story the longer the chunks will be. The format might change entirely too. Please leave suggestions comments etc. thanks for reading!

* * *

Today I arrived in Skyrim, the cold province that those I once knew warned me to never go to. Yet here I am, and I am in search for a man. He's known as the Dragonborn, the defeater of Alduin the bringer of the End of Times. He, Dragonborn, who travelled to Sovngard and slayed Alduin with the Heroes of Old. Or so the Nords say. They are all so hogwash into belief of their myths, so full of their legends. They're all so feverish with blind faith that I cannot know what's true and what's not. This is the most difficult task I have ever taken, because all I have is a contract.  
No one here wants to talk. They all call him Dragonborn but that is not his name. He lives in seclusion, allowing the myth of Dragonborn to carry on his legacy. He has returned to being just a man, yet how can I find a man who is in avoidance of the one thing I know him by?  
I am here to kill him. A set contract I received from my elders back in High Rock. I am lithe, cunning, and silent, and the contract was awarded onto me. I cannot kill the Dragonborn obviously, cannot leave a mark behind else to spark another war in the war-hungry land of Nords. They would be blood hungry for the killer of the greatest Hero of Skyrim. I think I will be here for a very long time.  
I've learned the Dragonborn was to be executed in Helgen with the Stormcloack rebels. They say that is when Alduin first appeared, a calling that connected there two souls. Alduin arose to save the Hero from death, because the very strings of fate called it to be so. After Helgen, he travelled to Riverwood, and then on to Whiterun. I have just came from Helgen, overrun with bandits now. The destruction is true, and I am incline to believe Dragonborn was really there. I could sense it. The strings' vibrations were strong, prickling the every hair on my body. I could sense his essence, forever trapped in the strings there. If only I could pluck them, read them, like the scholars of the elders. There in Helgen were also the essence of Ulfric, Tulius, and Alduin. I could feel them all pulsing against me. Four strong presences of fate all convened in one spot. No one thinks Helgen is important anymore, but the vibrations I felt sent me into ecstasy.  
I am now resting in Riverwood. My contract said to speak to a woman named Delphine, but the man said she is long gone to better things. So this leaves me in the dark, to follow blindly the pulsations I feel. May fate bless me, and may it guide me.  
I will perform the black sacrament to call the attention of the Dark Brotherhood. This Brotherhood has not had a connection with mine for many eras, but I require their help. If anyone is to know who is the Dragonborn, it's they. I only hope they do not kill me.

* * *

I was taken in the night, to a shack in the forest many stone throws away from Riverwood. I suspect I have been poisoned with sleep root. A woman named Astrid, of the Dark Brotherhood, seemed to think I owed her a kill for any information or relevance. In the shack were three hooded figures, a Nord sellsword, a woman, and a Kajiit. I killed the cat, blood on my hands that I haven't felt in a long time. I could not feel the vibrations. I feel I am off the path, but Astrid invited me to the Dark Brotherhood sanctum. She either has plans to induct me, or plans to kill me. Otherwise I would not be bestowed such an honor. I travel to Morthal, then, for a carriage ride to Falkreath. Such a journey, and I am running out of coin.

* * *

They inducted me into the Dark Brotherhood with the kind of smiles that said I should be thankful. I took one glance around the sanctum and realized it was a filth-ridden cave. I didn't know how they could hold their heads high, and what's worse they didn't even follow the 5 sacrements anymore. Astrid and her husband were by far the worst. They walked and talked like they were doing a favour, when they had lost everything the Dark Brotherhood once stood for. They were just killers. They heard a rumor someone was wanted dead and they killed them and that's it. That's not mighty or great, that's pathetic. I feel shame that I am apart of their group, especially now that I'm suspecting they might not know a thing about the Dragonborn. What became of the Night Mother, the Listener and the Speaker? They are just a sham, a disgusting remnant of what once was.  
I asked Astrid about the Dragonborn, but she insists I prove my loyalty to the family first by killing three targets. It's with great resistance that I do not roll my eyes at how stupid this assassin leader is. What's more, I know she doesn't trust me or want me there. She's waiting for me to botch up, which won't happen. What she doesn't know is that I am an assassin from High Rock. I told her I was looking for someone, but that was it. The idiot didn't even question me. I'm shocked they aren't already extinct with the low level they operate at. Are they desperate, or that stupid?

* * *

Skyrim seems to be in ruins. I travelled from the Dark Brotherhood sanctum, to Ivarstead and killed my first contract. I followed the waterways which should lead me to another village soon enough. All over I just see bandits and run down towns all talking about the glory days which are long gone. Skyrim is a place of honour, yet I feel none here. The people are all hollow and afraid and locked indoors. They hold their heads high with nothing to say worthy of praise, and feel entitlement simply from their bloodlines. They talk of Ysgrommor and Talos as if they knew them in their childhood. Who are these people, who assume so?  
Still my hunt continues. I heard a story at a mill along the way where I spent the night. The miller said the Dragonborn came through here many years ago, on his way to Riften. How long ago, the man could not remember. He was old, and said it could have been 2 years, or 2 months. He said he lost track of time when all he did was work the mills. I did not feel sorry for him, instead made a pact to travel to Riften once I finished my contracts with the Dark Brotherhood.

* * *

I killed the others, at a mill outside Windhelm and in Dawnstar. I returned to Astrid and was happy to at least see she did not lie to me. She knew a few things about the Dragonborn - he was Thane of Whiterun, though she was unsure if the title still held. I would go there and check the records, speak with the Jarl or his steward. One of them must remember him. Astrid also told me he had a lot of money, and had been looking to buy a house in Solitude. I asked her if he had many friends, and she said yes. I will have to be careful who I speak to, then, for he may hear word someone is coming for him. She also said he was briefly enrolled at the College in Winterhold, though he never attended class. Word was reached he was seen in the Ratways in Riften as well, dawned in thieves armour. The Dragonborn has been a busy fellow.  
I will now explain why I am to kill him. My associates take up contracts carefully, and do not accept all that come to us. We live in an academy in High Rock, where the scholars study the vibrations. When a contract is drawn, the scholars must study it to feel what fate asks of it. If it is not in fate's favour, we do not accept, for to test fate is to ask for death. Just look at Alduin's fall. From the moment he was born he was testing fate, pushing the vibrations away. And so it became that it was his fate to die, so sure of this that he was the one to save his slayer from death.  
The scholar's accepted this contract though. They do not explain why - we assassin's are not allowed to know. It is meant to be outside our knowledge why and how fate acts as it does, and what is to come when we finish our tasks. Even if contracts are drawn for the simplest of reasons, they are all considered carefully by scholars. Sometimes it only takes a scholar a brief moment to know if fate accepts it or not, and sometimes, such as the case of the Dragonborn, it takes many months. I don't know who drew up the contract, but my Elder does. I am not allowed to know why he is wanted dead, though if I may speculate I suspect it may just be someone trying to make a statement. However, fate accepts this contract and that is all that is needed.  
I am an assassin, and when I turn 30 I am old enough to enroll as a scholar. It is my hopes to be one, if I am not killed. We are all intune with the vibrations, we are all taught when we are inducted to notice them and read them. However, some chose to stay an assassin, while others chose to pursue knowledge and alignment with fate. I will chose that path.  
For now I rest in this Dark Brotherhood cave. I will leave them tomorrow and never return. I set out for Whiterun, and then to Riften.  
I cannot sleep, though. I am painted with the marks of reminders, blood from the eyes and blood from the mouth. Do not believe all you see and do not let your mouth guide you to a place you're not meant to be. Instead we must focus on mind, focus on sound, focus on all the senses but those that can lie to us. Eyes and mouth are the only senses that do not feel the vibrations, so they are the least important. I stare at my reflection tonight, for the first time in awhile I see myself. Vanity is not allowed, so it has been many years since I have seen myself. I have changed, grown from a child to a woman. I am now 19. My hair is brown, tied back in a ponytail. My eyes are green. My skin is pale underneath my war paint. I remove my hair from the ponytail and let it flow over my shoulders and for once I see that I am a woman. If my Elder were to see me, she would give me a reprimand scar - a deep cut meant to remind us to never do something again. I have three, but I know some assassins who have twenty. We are not allowed to believe in gender. We swear an oath to give up all pleasures of the body, and all motives that are guided by our gender's curse. Some assassins' undergo a procedure when they turn 30 that rids them of their gender once and for all. To be a scholar, it is necessary. The men are fixed like a gelding, the woman are cut open and their womb is removed. I fear it, but I accept it. For all my life I have never considered any other alternative. I have lived genderless for so long that my mind has never allowed me to see myself as a woman.  
And yet in this reflection curiosity grows. I can feel the vibrations... I am not doing wrong. I know I will pay for this curiosity later - this is what fate tells me - but I am not out of fate's favour for tonight. I touch my hair, my face. I take my clothes off and gaze upon my body. I am a woman, and I see the flesh of it. The curves, the breasts. My nipples are pointed and erect. I touch them, and feel a hot current go up my spine and down into the flesh between my legs. My legs are long and slender, my body bony and muscular. I see scars of battle cut into my flesh and I stroke them. My reprimand scars are aligned on my spine, and I turn now to see them for the first time. I am shocked to see they are letters in a foreign language, a language the scholars speak. I had always thought they were just cuts. We are not allowed to show them to anyone, and so we are never allowed to be nude in front of other assassins. We are all given one reprimand scar when we are inducted, the other two I have recieved for failures I've committed. I botched a contract early in my career, when I was 15, and I was given it to remind me to never fail again. I served time in jail for it, too, for I was caught with my blade in a man's throat. The other I recieved for daring to speak to a scholar. We are taught that we are the bottom feeders of the academy, and the scholars are the kings. I was young, and did not know better.  
My hands go down, touching my ribs and my waist and my stomach. I place a hand over my womb, and further still. I cannot feel the vibrations anymore and I wonder if I'm pushing my luck. I slip my fingers into the warm folds, only for a moment and yet I feel the warm liquid of my flesh run down my leg. There is an ache there now and I stop. My breathing is heavy and laboured like after a long battle and I can feel my heart thundering in my chest. I have pushed too far. I gaze at my reflection in the still waters, feeling the liquid run down my leg. I do not let myself feel shame, but I dress quickly and by the time I am done the ache that I felt has vanished.


End file.
